Environmental
April 28, 2008
At Toren, Even the Parking Goes Green
The New York Times name-checked Toren (a Brownstoner advertiser) in an article this weekend about the growing trend of developers using green features as a marketing tool. It used to be, even if developers used green building techniques, they weren't mentioned because "buyers associated that type of construction with lower-quality design or a lack of comfort." Now, green is the new black in New York City (though we doubt the same will be true for clothes, except on St. Patrick's Day). “There’s no question green adds a competitive advantage," Donald Capoccia, managing principal of Toren developer BFC Partners, told the Times. His development (where 15 of 240 units have sold since going on sale earlier this month) is aiming for gold LEED certification, second only to platinum in the environmental design rating system. And while the city dilly-dallies about finding a location for new power plants (there are currently none in the pipeline), Toren's energy will be supplied by five on-site 100-kilowatt generators. The green-focus doesn't end there for the building. In the hierarchy of parking lots, there once was only two categories: handicap and non-handicap. Toren has added one more: Hybrid. Bill Ross, director of Development Marketing at Halstead Brooklyn, told us hybrid vehicles will "get premiere parking so they don't have to wait as long" in the new parking garage, which is on the second and third floor (and not underground) because of an abandoned train station below. Take that, gas guzzlers!
When to Shout ‘Eco-Friendly’ [NY Times]
Closing Bell: Could The Toren Land the Mac Store? [Brownstoner]
SOM-designed Toren About to Hit the Market [Brownstoner]
March 14, 2008
Nabe Groups Get State Grant to Study Gowanus Brownfields
In one of his last acts as Governor, Eliot Spitzer sent a little love to Brooklyn in the form of a $250,000 grant for a team of local groups to study and identify brownfields along the Gowanus Canal and in abutting properties. The money is going to Friends of Community Board 6, Friends and Residents of Greater Gowanus, and the Gowanus Canal Community Development Corporation for all three to work together to complete a nomination study for five brownfield sites along the Gowanus Canal. The funding was doled out as part of a $7.25 million package meant to spur economic revitalization in blighted areas across New York State, and it will allow the organizations to hire consultants. “Once this acreage is transformed into clean, usable land, it will be a tremendous asset to our community," said Assemblyman Felix Ortiz in a statement yesterday. "I am very enthusiastic about this important initial step towards achieving our goal.”
Brownfield Study Funding Notice [ny.gov]
Photo by wallyg.
March 10, 2008
Future Brooklyn May Be All Washed Up, Says Scientist
A Columbia scientist has produced a NYC version of "An Inconvenient Truth," Gotham Gazette reports, showing how climate change could wreak havoc on New York City over the next 80 years. The report, put together by Klaus Jacob, a special research scientist at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University, illustrates how new developments on the Brooklyn waterfront—especially in Williamsburg and Greenpoint—could be flooded by strong storms:
Areas of the Greenpoint-Williamsburg waterfront slated for development that will bring tens of thousands of new residents stand a major risk of being flooded by a hurricane, according to the city's own maps. Sewers in Greenpoint already cannot deal with the rainwater from severe storms, such as those of last July and August...Much of the new development "will occur along the East River waterfront, which is subject to flooding from storm surges. New construction will result in significant changes to the floodplain that may reduce its capacity for flood retention or alter stormwater flow characteristics, said Brooklyn Community Board One's Rezoning Task Force in comments on the draft of an Environmental Impact Statements on rezoning the area to accommodate more development.
Scary stuff. The city is starting to try to face the disastrous problems that climate change may cause by creating a multi-agency Climate Change Task Force aimed at protecting infrastructure and looking to upgrade sewer systems. Jacob, meanwhile, says the city should reconsider allowing any new development on low-lying, flood prone areas. "That," he says, is the "price to be paid for pumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere."
City by the Sea—or Underneath It? [Gotham Gazette]
Klaus H. Jacob illustration from Gotham Gazette.
January 23, 2008
Yassky Floats Biodiesel Plan
Tomorrow the Environmental Protection Committee of the City Council will have a hearing on a bill introduced by Councilmember David Yassky that would gradually phase in the use of biodiesel in New York’s heating oil system. Yassky’s bill, the Bioheat Act, would require that heating oil retailers start selling oil that is 5 percent biodiesel by June 2011, 10 percent biodiesel by June 2013, and 20 percent biodiesel (or B20 biodiesel) thereafter. The use of a biodiesel blend would go a long way toward reducing the city’s greenhouse gas emissions, and oil mixes containing up to 20 percent biodiesel don’t require users to change their oil or fuel systems. Sound like a plan?
Photo by lucky_dog.
October 23, 2007
Gowanus Cleanup Update: Time and Money
Last night Community Board 6’s public safety/environmental protection committee held a public meeting about the Department of Environmental Protection and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Gowanus Canal Ecological Restoration Study. The $5 million partnership to study and spur cleanup of the canal has been going on for six years, and the good news is that it’s starting to result in concrete plans for revitalizing Lavender Lake. The bad news is that the plans the DEP and Army Corps have come up with aren’t exactly going to be implemented tomorrow, and they ain’t gonna come cheap.
Kevin Clarke, the DEP’s chief of Wastewater and Water Infrastructure and Support, gave a presentation about the department’s $125 million water quality improvement plan, which the state is likely to approve and set in motion sometime next year. The DEP intends to modernize the canal’s flushing tunnel and pumping stations so they process a lot more water on a daily basis and reduce the impact of sewer overflow into the waterway; the department projects that updating the two pieces of infrastructure will take almost four years, and they want to start that work by next fall. The plan also calls for preliminary dredging of the 1.8-mile-long Gowanus and periodically sending a boat onto the canal to engage in “floatable skimming” (“floatable” is DEP lingo for street garbage that’s made its way to the canal and decided against sinking). The dredging and garbage boat plans probably won’t come into play until sometime next decade. Mark Lulka, the Army Corps’ project manager, called the canal “a puzzle,” and said the Corps’ preliminary recommendations for ecosystem restoration involved dredging and capping sediments, possibly with wetlands creation. The Army Corps hopes to finish a final feasibility report about the measures by 2009 and begin work in 2012 or 2013. Update: Gowanus Lounge has additional coverage of last night's event here.
October 3, 2007
The Gowanus Canal: From PCBs to STDs
Green Brooklyn links to an excellent Scienceline article that details the Gowanus Canal’s history of toxic pollution and gives an overview of current plans to clean up the waterway. Scientists are debating whether it makes more sense to dredge the canal or cap its toxic sediments, and they’re also examining how to go about remediating the land around the Gowanus. One of the story’s revelations, however, is that researchers have found more than just run-of-the-mill scary stuff like lead, sulfur, cyanide, asbestos, PCBs, mercury and volatile organic compounds in the canal:
Nilofaur Haque, a biologist at the New York City College of Technology, has her students analyze water samples and observe the oily substance that coats the water’s surface each afternoon. “One group of students found gonohorrea in a water drop,” said Haque.
As Green Brooklyn notes, “Can’t wait for the ‘luxury condos.’”
Tainted Lavender [Scienceline]
Sick Oysters In Gonohorrea — I Mean Gowanus — Canal [Green Brooklyn]
September 13, 2007
Toxically Challenged? Domino Sugar Factory, Part I
This is the inaugural installment of a new feature that’ll examine environmental conditions at various sites throughout Brooklyn. The topic seems particularly pressing as developers plan more and more housing in areas that were, until very recently, home to heavy industry—and in some cases, still are. It’s well known that many of these areas—like large swaths of Gowanus, Red Hook, Williamsburg and Greenpoint, to name just a few—often have concomitant legacies of toxic contamination. What’s less known is the extent of pollution on specific sites; how one goes about identifying potential health risks; and, basically, whether moving to a shiny new condo in one of these neighborhoods sometimes amounts to moving to a toxic dump. We developed the feature along with Toxics Targeting, a company that’s mapped more than 21,000 government-reported toxic sites throughout New York City (see bottom for more info).
We decided the Domino Sugar factory, where plans to develop thousands of units of housing are picking up speed, would be a perfect place to start. Sugar refining occurred on the massive Williamsburg waterfront site from the 1850s until 2004, when American Sugar Refining pulled the plug on its operations and sold off the properties. Although the Domino factory was a hive of industrial activity for well over a century, its history—and the future of development efforts on the land—are inextricably linked to the industrial and manufacturing businesses all around it. Properties neighboring the Domino include the radioactive waste facility Radiac; ConEd and New York Power Authority plants; a brownfield; and a lot the Department of Environmental Protection has designated an “E” site, which signifies that it’s believed to be a hotbed of hazardous materials. In fact, compared to the environmental challenges at neighboring sites, the data tied to the Domino is relatively mild. This jibes with the developer's spin on the situation. At a press conference back on July 24, what Michael Lappin, CEO of the developer CPC Resources, said that there were "no major environmental issues." Of course that doesn't mean there are no issues at all...
Continue reading "Toxically Challenged? Domino Sugar Factory, Part I"
July 24, 2007
Video: Green Reno of a Prospect Heights B'stone
Check out this video of the green renovation of a Prospect Heights brownstone. The contractor Blake Holden walks through the work-in-progress, displaying and discussing the reclaimed wood flooring, salvaged doors and, yes, blue jean insulation. Lots o' fun.
Greening a Brownstone [Yahoo Video]
July 20, 2007
Green Roof For a Park Slope Brownstone
How cool is this. A Park Slope couple decided last year that they wanted to build a green roof atop their brownstone and found, through the Brownstoner Forum, a local design firm called Prospect Architecture (which, in the spirit of full disclosure, also advertises on the Forum). The project, which combined a green roof, photovoltaic array (solar power) and roof deck, is pretty unusual because of its small scale—most green roofs in the city to date (and there aren't that many of them) have been on larger buildings. Here's how the architects describe it:
Our design incorporates an intensive (which refers to the use of larger plants) green roof, a large Ipe wood (like teak) deck, a metal and Ipe roof over part of the deck, an aluminum clad bulkhead. A wall and trellis hide new a/c compressors. Solar panels will be installed on top of the roof over the deck, the bulkhead roof and in front of the a/c compressors and will provide roughly 50-60% of the clients power needs including the a/c system. Additionally, our design is experimenting with various shade tolerant plants, like ferns beneath the front solar array, which is expected to help cool the arrays and maintain their top efficiency as well as retain more moisture than the gravel alternative.
The design provokes a feeling of walking through a small meadow while at the same time reminding one of the city that is all around. It is a private oasis with distant vistas of Manhattan and the surrounding neighborhoods of Brooklyn. The planters and benches around the perimeter of the deck add greenery and carry one’s eye past the immediate rooftops to the more panoramic of views. On the south side of the garden, an aluminum-clad wall fashioned with vine covered trellises shield one from the sight and sound of the mechanicals. The specific placement and structure of the architectural elements not only maximize the use of the entire roof, but the modern design acts as a representation of the dichotomy between city and nature.
And what about the cost? A little over $200 a square foot, including demo, structural enhancement, new stairs and bulkhead. Lots more pics on the jump.
If you've done, or are in the midst of doing, a cool interior or exterior project like this that you'd like to share, please send us an email at brownstoner@brownstoner.com.
April 6, 2007
515 Fifth Avenue: The Slope Goes Green
Frustrated by the level of new design in the brownstone neighborhoods they called home, architects Joanna Frank and Aida Stoddard started Bright City Development in 2005 to modern, contextual, eco-friendly design to the area. The pair's first project is 515 Fifth Avenue, a six-story building with 15 residential units and ground-floor retail. Six units are available on the A&H site currently at between $650 and $700 per square foot. One very cool feature is the green roof, shown here in its current state of partial completion along with a sample of what will cover it. Before the cynics jump in, the theory behind a green roof is that it helps avoid drainage problems in city sewers during heavy rains (which can lead to sewage overflows) and it also reduces some of the "heat island" effects in summertime. Other "green" aspects of the building include bamboo flooring and cabinets, fireslate countertops made of recycled materials and solar-powered exterior lighting; all appliances have the highest energy-efficiency ratings as well. Sounds pretty cool to us.
5 One 5 Condominiums [Aguayo & Huebener] GMAP
Old South Slope Salvation Army Store Gets Juicy and Green [Curbed]